Ah studentships and paperwork. Absolutle pain in the arse. I'm into the last 8 months of a 3year PhD, one of the 2 institutes that I'm with only accepted I existed within the last 3 months.... I'm owed about €16,000 in unpaid scholarship payments and being tossed around by beurocracy like some little rag doll because people want in on my research to boost their own positions. I hope you get your loan sorted fella, Uni is the greatest experience I've had to date.
Your application seems a lot harder than mine. All i needed was my N.I. number and uni course could so they could actually confirm i was a student. All done on line.
Mostly, their parents pay. I work and study at the same time all (academic) year and work at least two jobs full time (my own plus another 7-4/9-5/8-5:30) from my exams finish until I start back the next semester. It works out all right most of the time. Until you crash your car and don't get insurance money for 5 months because the insurance compny goes into administration Like I said, most of the time.
when I was at uni, they got my NI number incorrect. caused no end of annoyance trying to tell them who the hell i was with the computer saying "no". All done and dusted now, and im slowly paying it back... which is ANOTHER lamentable affair. the SLC have decided that i shall be charged the pricely sum on 5 pound (5!! ) a month. They are supposed to up that to 200 ish if i dont send them my income details which i havnt done for the passed 2 years. still zero interest on it at the moment so im slowly paying off my 10K loan (at least till september)
I was lucky in many ways, just before I started uni my father was made redundant and has been unable to find work since 2005 as the field of work he is in, is rather hush hush and got shifted to mainland Europe, Scotland and America. The company that shall remain nameless gave him £15K upon leaving to which he told me to stuff the student loan idea, and just paid uni for me. The company then found him a 4 month contract in Europe which generated just over £22K after tax. They were sad to see him go, but powers above knew better for the company (Sarcasm) He is a wise fella, even in 2004 he knew a recession was coming even predicting that it would start with the American banks, so the decision of paying for uni upfront and not putting his son into a massive debt only to end up paying it off during the massive recession. I've been looking for work since finishing, but it’s a little dry out there at the moment but at least I am debt free for now. Only having a finite amount of cash in my account each term meant if I wanted something I had to work for it so holidays were spent working my arse off. However knowing there was no magic money appearing in my account during the academic term also meant my wallet was glued shut. My 1st and 2nd year at uni I did nothing but study and bum around on bit-tech in my spare time, 2nd year was made easier socially on me when my girlfriend moved up here with me to start her course at uni. 3rd year was placement year full of nothing but stress by my boss, in a start up company he no experience and was making mad decisions with no budget on tiny time constraints and it broke me big time. Final year which I have just finished I started with no passion for the topic, and wasted my first term trying to keep myself mentally happy, but that time killed my 2nd term of the year causing me to burn myself out before Easter and scrape though the final term. I was predicted a 1st degree, but with unfair marking on one assignment and with everything else it dropped to a 2:2 with a 58.95%, that is 0.05% off of a 59% which is automatic bump to 60% and a 2:1 classification. Everyone I know is shocked, not to sound conceited but I was the go to guy on any problem and able to talk to any staff member on a level field of conversion, with all staff members deeply saddened by my final result trying to find ways to increase my grade. I know there is a lot there to read, and people’s stories of uni are vastly different to everyone else's, but I only have personal regrets not regrets of university itself. Students preparing for your final year, mark my words 'You are in for the hardest, most time consuming and stressful year of your lives' , forget about student nights, and enjoy the weekend instead, treat the year like a 9 to 9 job, yes 9 to 9! Then forget Christmas and Easter, I did and still only got a 2:2. It will be the most epic and demanding year of your life, and yet totally worth it is that piece of paper in the end with a classification can make finding work so much easier the higher the grade. I'll shut up now, but I hope some of you take my advice and prosper from it, if you do don't forget the rep button so I know who actually cares about there university grade.
Rock on! Called student finance up earlier to find out if there was any progress with my application. Well, they've found all the evidence I sent them (finally, 8 weeks after originally sending it all, 4 "Urgent - Evidence Needed" emails.). And it's now all being processed. Plus I also got a place in halls for Uni, and the halls I wanted, which is tres bon.
